Eight Years Old

 

Our sweet, beautiful Rachel is 8 years old today!!! Time definitely does fly. I already know this is going to be one emotional weekend. Rachel's going to be baptized on my birthday and then the next day will be Mother's Day. I can't think of a better Birthday-Mother's Day gift. It's been an amazing journey so far with this girl and I've learned so much from her. 

Rachel is 48 inches tall and weighs 42 pounds. About a month ago, she was pretty excited to discover she weighed 42 pounds. We've been telling her for years that she has to be 40 pounds to transition to a booster seat in the car. Shhhh...don't tell her that since she's now 8, she legally doesn't need to be in any type of car seat. We play it pretty safe. :) 

This girl loves to play, whether it's playing outside or inside. She comes home from school every day, gets her homework done, and then just wants to play, play, play. I've given up on hassling her about her reading. She hates to read. :( Makes me sad, because I love to read. But maybe one day we'll find that series of books that she'll LOVE. She's an awesome reader though, she's just not into it. She'd rather play. We've decided she is a bit of a tomboy. I'm trying to talk her into playing soccer this Fall. We'll see... Right now she's doing gymnastics, but I think she's ready to move on to something else. When I'm good about sitting down at the piano with her, she learns to play. We haven't been very good very recently though... We need to get going on that while she's interested. 

Rachel is a very well-liked girl. She has lots of friends at school and stays pretty busy with play dates when we don't have other activities going on. Her best friend right now is Isabel. They play and have so much fun together. And they're both really good at including Audrey. Rachel is a pleaser. She wants to make others happy and for them to be proud of her. She's very hard on herself when she fails in that regard. She doesn't like getting in trouble. She has quite the conscience.  Rachel loves her teachers at school and at church. She's a very lucky girl to have some really amazing teachers!

We're so grateful for our amazing Rachel! She brings so much joy every day to our home.